Important "off line" Structures not kitted by manufacturers

[C.K. Eddlemon]

Many new manufacturers, including Walthers' Cornerstone Series, have given us dozens of versitile, realistic, convincing structures for use on our layouts.  The Cornerstone Fire Station is a prime example, but many manufacurers are giving us better products than they were offering 15-20 years ago.

Yet there are some I'd love to see kitted that are not currently available (at least not in a believable form).

I am starting a thread listing buildings which I'd like to see made available by a manufacturer -- others, please join in the following ways: (1) Add additional buildings you'd like to see available, especially those which ought to be; (2) If you know of any structures availible that fit the bill, that someone has said is NOT available, please tell us about it.  We'd like to know.

Here are some buildings we need someone to manufacture kits for:

(1) County courthouse (needs only be about 60x80 feet, monumental, with a tall clock tower -- suitable for a town square -- can double as police station, sherriff's office, post office, or county offices).  With all the hype Cornerstone has been putting about railroads on main street in small towns, you'd expect to see a medium- to large courthouse with a tall clock tower offered by now.

(2) School buildings -- especially elementary and high school types. Any era, replete with 8-12 classrooms, gymnasium/cafeteria/autotorium or library space and school offices -- yes, these can take up space fast, but I am convinced that a complete school facility can be modeled in an area about 18x28 inches or less.

(3) Apartment buildings.  The Heljan Synagogue is nice, but we need apartment buildings from the 1920s and modern eras that mimick popular architecture -- be it the English/Tudor/Italian/Rennaissance of the 1920s, the concrete structures of the 1960s, the pleasant residential structures of contemporary times. 

(4) College buildings -- The train is how many commute.  Some foreign manufacturers offer post offices and industries which may suffice, but we need buildings without the tacky little stores on the ground level -- buildings which look like they could contain classrooms and dormitories.

(5) Modern (not necessarily contemporary-styled) churches -- medium sized churches will do fine.  I once pastored a c.1978 colonial style church in a small town in Alabama, with a small fellowship hall/kitchen and five sunday school classrooms -- it would make a wonderful HO kit, I think. Churches need education wings, not just a chapel.

(6) Contemporary drugstores, such as Walgreens.

(7) Small hospitals and medical facilities

I'm sure there are others. Ayone care to comment or add to this list?

[SteamGene]

City Classics has a set of five story buildings that easily could be apartment buildings.  DPM's hotel could be one, too. 
You are right about the school - none available.  I want to figure out how to make a model of a military school - along the lines of VMI or the Citadel - that is essentially square with an open area. 
Model Power has some government type buildings - not real great, but okay for background use, I think.
Gene

[cmgn9712]

I sense you are a teacher since you seem to be concerned with sccools. First, they intentionally do not have schools near RR tracks because of safety issues.
Modern schools and colleges and hospitals are very large -a waste of space on a layout where space is a premium and have no relationship to railroads.
There are many churches made by European manufacturers - check the Walthers catalog.
The reason there are not contemporary stores and fast food places is purely a licensing issue due to the liability.

[Seasaltchap]

cmgn9712 : I believe SteamGene previously introduced himself as an English Teacher in the Military for a number of years.

Why not scratch build? There are plenty of styrene sections. art board, ply etc. to make something like a Walgreens - it ain't Gothic! With a little juxter of digital photos and scanning adverts, the artwork should transfer to scale easily for you. Similarly with several of the others you quote.

[Rich R]

cmgn9712 : I believe SteamGene previously introduced himself as an English Teacher in the Military for a number of years.

Why not scratch build? There are plenty of styrene sections. art board, ply etc. to make something like a Walgreens - it ain't Gothic! With a little juxter of digital photos and scanning adverts, the artwork should transfer to scale easily for you. Similarly with several of the others you quote.

Thank you, thank you thank you! Why not scratch build indeed?
Looking through the latest Walthers HO catalog ... err.. reference book I notice that a lot of craftsman kits are no longer available. Almost everything is plastic!
Campbell still makes some decent offerings and a few others but even Finescale no longer makes a line of kits as he did when he started out. Guess people are more interested in buying than building and I find that a little sad somehow. This hobby isn't dieing, it's committing suicide.
A question such as why doesn’t Bachmann/Walthers/Ford/GM make a (whatever) is OK to a point, but a better idea would be why don’t you make a (whatever) yourself or at least try? The manufacturer gives you the pilot, what it turns into is up to you.
Back in the 70’s or so parts were available so that if you wanted to build a model of a Canadian locomotive complete with all the bells and whistles and all weather cabs you could simply go to your local hobby shop and buy them! Sadly, not so today.
If you look around you will find a lot of stuff is available and what isn’t could be built from something else. Kit bashing! What an original idea!
Please remember this is simply my opinion and not intended to offend anyone in anyway. Doubtless I’ve done so nevertheless.
Bring on the Spanish Inquisition and smite the heretic! 


Mostly harmless.
Rich R

[Seasaltchap]

Rich R : Yes!

Having retired from the the UK to the US replete with choice items of my collection, I see a marked difference between the two countries, where there appears a stronger influence in the UK to scratch build than I have experienced since being here.

Part of my joy in model railways has been to visit sites with a camera, drawing pad, pencil and stanley tape. The UK is well seved with reference books, HMRS, and NRM at York, who are a good source for information. The internet too, has opened a new world of opportunity for railway research at a distance.

My feeling is if you can build a good layout with good scenery, you can scratch build about anything if you try.

Regards

[Rich R]

Seasaltchap,

Nice to have the first response be a positive one. Thank you for that!
Oddly or perhaps not, I find that almost all my modeling friends are members of the commonwealth in one form or another. Be that Canada, New Zealand, Australia or the greater UK for that matter, (England, Scotland and Wales)
Maybe it’s the type of modeling being done there, I’m not sure but I did ask a friend why you could buy a locomotive kit in England and it came without wheels?  Keyword here is without. His explanation was that there were so many different standards that it was more or less left up to the model builder himself (key word is builder) as to what size or gauge he wanted and then he would simply order those from another supplier.
Now I’ve just spent some time going through the Walthers book and I can see what CK was talking about when he mentioned a lack of certain structure types. I did find a lot of building kits that could be either combined into or converted to exactly what he wanted with a little blood sweat and tears.
The main thing is that if you are not really great at one particular sector of the hobby but you are good at another trade off with someone who has skills that you lack. He builds your building and you wire his decoders or what have you.
I model in 1/48th scale but I’ll tackle anything in any scale that is big enough for me to see. However what I was referring to in my post was 1/87th.

Might I enquire as to where you got your screen name? I’m ex USCG and have lived on the water almost all of my 62 years on this blue green orb I only picked up two names. Fishhooks as a boy and Boats while in the service.  I only earned the latter. Well after I got married I also picked up “Filthy beast” from her indoors.

Cheers,
Rich R

[rogertra]

AFAIC, a kit is just a supply of kitbashing parts.

I frequently purchase interesting looking kits.  The reason they are interesting is that they contain nice looking walls, window openings and windows, doors and doorways, loading platforms, canopys, roof details, etc., etc..

A kit to me isn't what the manufacturer calls it, for marketing purposes, but just a collection of that I previously listed.

When the kit gets home, the box gets opened, the instructions go into the little round file, the walls go into the walls box, windows into the windows box, doors into the doors box, et.c, etc..

There is no such thing as "Structures not kitted by manufacturers" all there are are kits that supply a great source of parts.  If I want a building, I build it from the parts in the many parts boxes I've sorted the kits into.

[SteamGene]

While it may be true that schools tend to stay away from tracks, it is not always the case.  Fishersville Elementary School, Fishersville, Va, where my wife went to elementary school, has its playground adjoining the mainline of the C&O - then, CSX now.  Likewise, there is a high school that sits beyond the Valley Line, east of Harrisonburg, VA.  If the East Broad Top ever has the line to Mount Union restored, the track will go ACROSS the campus of a high school.  I'm sure there are plenty of other examples.  Remember, once upon a time kids rode in the bed of a pickup truck, standing up and looking over the cab. 
Gene

[Seasaltchap]

The problem is not only the danger of rail derailments, crashes and noise!

In 1944 we lived near, and I went to Wimbledon Park School, immediately next to Southern Railways rail sheds. The problem then was stray German bombing(V1's) intended for the rail lines, many missed and went into surrounding housing.

I had the dubious distinction of causing an Air Raid warning. I was humming away with my Dinky Toys in the back yard when a woman several houses along in the terrace, telephoned in that she heard V1's in the area - and the sires went off!

It is funny reflecting back, that I was more frightened at that age of a big dog I had to pass each day back and forth in the alleyway to school.

[SteamGene]

Intended for the rail yards?  I hate to tell somebody who was actually attacked by the V-1, but its CeP was such that hitting England was something of an accomplishment!  If it was aimed at London and hit within a hundred miles they probably claimed a "direct hit." 
BTW, my step-mother grew up under them, too, and the Blitz, and the Little Blitz.
Gene

[rogertra]

Not only was the V1 target, and the V2 for that matter, "London", anywhere in London for that matter, so was the RAF's target "Berlin, or Frankfurt or any German city.  The average RAF bomber's bomb drop came within 7 miles, yes, seven miles, from the centre of the target.

Even the American's with their much vaunted daylight raids only did a little better, coming with in three or so miles of the actual target.

To say that the V!, or the V2 was targeted at a "railyard" or anything specific is like saying the RAF night bomber force was aiming for a factory, when they were just aiming for civilians, any civilian.

[SteamGene]

Roger,
as we drift off topic again - the problem with American accuracy was the SOP.  Only the lead plane had the Norton bombsite.  I'm not sure if this is for the entire mission, for each wing, or for each group, but Nortons were few.  When the bombadier released his bombs, the crosshairs were on the target, the sight was corrected for altitude, wind speed, and direction, and probably whether the bombadier's girlfriend was a blonde or a brunette.  But his release was the signal for all the planes behind him to release their bombs.  They weren't totally over the target yet, or pefectly over the target.  So Coffin Corner Charlie might well be three miles behid when he saw bombs falling from the planes in front of him. 
It was only on something like the Ploesti (sp) attack that each bomber actually attacked a specific target. 
Gene

[Rich R]

Gene,

It was Norden by the way and not a bad piece of work either. It was far from secret however and as the Germans were committed to dive bombing they didn't use the Norden bomb sight even though they had a set of plans for it. An analog computer to be honest.
Oddly it did serve into the Vietnam era. Had to dig up some of the old workers who knew how to repair and operate the damn things but I believe around 13 or so were in use in Vietnam. Did well there also. Accuracy was within 1/5th of a mile. The bit about having a pistol built into it to shoot the damn thing to avoid it falling into enemy hands was indeed a myth.
My father worked for Norden as an engineer and Norden became Norden Ketay and Sperry Rand and so forth. They still use the rail inspection cars to this day.
For better reading check out http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1004.htm
Enola Gay bombardier Thomas Ferebee seemed to have some luck using one but then it was rather hard to miss using that type of munition.
The B-17 and B-24 pilots I knew in the fifties often said that they would drop their bombs miles before they were near the target as all they wanted to do was get home in one piece. I cannot say that’s the gospel truth but I did hear it more than once or twice.
25 missions is a bit of a stretch when you are being hauled around in an airplane that’s flown (However briefly) by it’s bomb sight. 


Don't Panic,
Rich R

[Seasaltchap]

The V1's with ramjets and later the A2's (V2) "donkydrop" missiles came on the heels of previous conventional German bombing raids directed at industrial targets.

The British had a system of intersecting radio beams used for triangular navigation to their targets. This was said to be more accurate in the night time RAF bombing runs than the daylight raids of the Americans.

A family friend of ours in New York in the early 50's was suing the US government for patent jumping his pentode valve necessary for radar sets. The UK was able to jump patents for the war effort, but not the US.